Officials develop plan to bring water to Ralphton

County officials may be closing in on enough money to bring public water to Ralphton residents, many who have been hauling bottled water into their homes for more than a decade because of contaminated sources.

Somerset County Redevelopment Authority Executive Director Steven Spochart said authority members plan to meet with the county commissioners to discuss a twofold request aimed at eliminating the $500,000 shortfall needed to link the village with the Jenner Township Municipal Water Authority.

First, the agency will seek approval from the commissioners for a cooperative agreement between Quemahoning and Jenner townships, where Ralphton is located; the Jenner Township Municipal Water Authority, the eventual owner and operator of the system; county commissioners, who must authorize the funding process; and the redevelopment authority, the administrator of the funds.

Next, it will request authorization to submit an application for a $500,000 Community Development Block Grant from the state Department of Community and Economic Development, he said.

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Ralphton has been a priority for the commissioners for a number of years, according to Commissioner Pamela Tokar-Ickes.

During the past two years, about $800,000 in federal funds has been secured for the water infrastructure project, she said. Those funds hopefully can be used for leverage to obtain the remaining $500,000 needed to complete the estimated $1.5 million project, she said.

“It is all about money and we are looking for it now,” Commissioner Jim Marker said.

Spochart hopes the CDBG program is the answer.

The redevelopment authority recently finished an income survey of Ralphton residents that qualifies the village to compete for the funds from the state program, he said. To qualify, 51 percent of households in the project area must be low-income households.

The potential funding will connect Ralphton to Jenner Township’s storage tank at North Star Business Park. The project would include fire hydrants, a pump station and 15,000 feet of 6-inch water line that will run cross-country through the woods and down Ralphton Road, Spochart said.

Water service is still at least a year away for the small community of about 50 people, he said.

The CDBG grant applications will not be reviewed until June and the grants will probably not be awarded until later in the summer, Spochart said. The subsequent engineering and design work could delay the project until 2011, he said.